By Alessandro Mauro
To submit comments and updates: alessandro.mauro@telecomitalia.it
In Japan, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) is the dominant player in the optical fibre market with over 70% of market share, while in the DSL market it reaches around 35% of the market.
The Japanese government were then considering the possibility of separating the NTT access network to allow other operators to compete on the infrastructure. The hypothesis on the table were many, ranging from creating a division within NTT up to create a completely separate company.
In October 2009 a task force to start discussions on new ICT policies was launched. In particular, the so called Hikari-no Michi vision was launched, aimed at realizing a society where “broadband services are adopted in every household by sometimes around 2015”.
In November 2010 a government panel, which is working on an initiative to make fibre-optic broadband available to all households, declared that NTT will not be forced to spin off its fibre unit. Nevertheless, the operator must open up its network to the competitors; the panel has also chosen to set up a 'firewall' between NTT's fibre-optic operations and the other operations.
In particular, the adoption of a “Functional separation” model has been considered the most realistic, compared to capital or structural separation. However, as far as the functional separation is concerned, a document of the ICT Policy Taskforce explains how it would be appropriate to take into consideration the issue of the physical separation of the access network and the retail division, the restricted access to the information systems and the implementation of an effective monitoring system.
Should the competition level in the market will be considered not sufficient by 2015, the decision may be revised.
According to the government plan, all households will be FTTH connected by 2015.
In Japan the debate around which kind of approach would be most appropriate (that is to say service-based or facility-based, with a competition developed between the NTT NGAN, the cable or the wireless networks) is very actual.
The subscription of the NGAN services is quite low compared with the coverage reached. This is also due to the competition of LTE services; for this reason, in 2012 NTT reduced the prices of NGAN services.
Useful links:
http://www.soumu.go.jp/english/index.html
www.ntt.co.jp